Contents
1 History
2 Transportation
2.1 Subway
2.2 Metro
3 Features
4 MacArthur Park connection
5 The boulevard from west to east
6 Landmarks from west to east
7 Major intersections
8 In popular culture
9 See also
10 References
11 Further reading
11.1 Books
12 External links

History[edit]
Much of the length of Wilshire Boulevard can be traced back to the indigenous Tongva people who used it to bring back tar from the La Brea pits in today's Miracle Mile section of Wilshire Blvd, back to their settlement on the coast. This road was later used by Spanish explorers and settlers, calling it El Camino Viejo ('The Old Road'). The route that ultimately became Wilshire crossed the original pueblo of Los Angeles and five of the original Spanish land grants, or ranchos.[6]
Wilshire was pieced together from various streets over several decades. It began in the 1870s as Nevada Avenue in Santa Monica, and in the 1880s as Orange Street between Westlake (now MacArthur) Park and downtown. Nevada and Orange were later renamed as parts of Wilshire.[6]
The boulevard was named for Henry Gaylord Wilshire (1861–1927), an Ohio native who made and lost fortunes in real estate, farming, and gold mining.[7] In 1895 he began developing 35 acres of a barley field,[8] stretching westward from Westlake Park for an elite residential subdivision, and donated to the city a strip of land 120 feet wide by 1,200 feet long for a boulevard, on the conditions that it would be named for him and that railroad lines and commercial or industrial trucking would be banned.[6] The road first appeared on a map under its present name in 1895.[9] A historic apartment building on the corner of Wilshire Blvd. and S. Kenmore Ave., the Gaylord, carries his middle name.[10][11]
The Wilshire Boulevard home of J. Paul Getty was used as the filmset for the 1950 film Sunset Boulevard: it was demolished in 1957.[12]

Transportation[edit]
Main articles: Purple Line (Los Angeles Metro) and Red Line (Los Angeles Metro)
Subway[edit]
The Purple and Red subway lines of the Los Angeles Metro run along Wilshire Boulevard from just past the 7th/Figueroa Street station before serving the Westlake/MacArthur Park and Wilshire/Vermont stations, where the Purple Line continues along Wilshire to serve two stations at Normandie Avenue and at Western Avenue in Koreatown, while the Red Line branches off to terminate in North Hollywood.
The construction of the future Purple Line extension along Wilshire Boulevard commenced in November 2014. The construction timeline would see the project from the existing Wilshire/Western station to the planned Wilshire/La Cienega station on the corner of Wilshire and La Cienega Boulevard, to be completed by 2023. The second phase got officially under way on February 23, 2018 from Wilshire/La Cienega to Century City Station. Phase three of the Purple Line extension, when fully completed, will extend to UCLA and Westwood/VA Hospital, and will follow Wilshire Boulevard for most of its route. Phase four to downtown Santa Monica is still in the planning stages and has no funding.
Metro[edit]
Metro Local Line 20, Metro Rapid Line 720, and Santa Monica Transit Line 2 operate along Wilshire Boulevard. Due to the high ridership of line 720, 60-foot (18 m) NABI articulated buses are used on this route, and bus lanes are in place along some segments of the line.

Features[edit]
All of the boulevard is at least four lanes in width, and most of the portion between Hoover Street and Robertson Boulevard has a raised center median. The widest portion is in the business district of central Westwood, where mobs of pedestrians crossing Wilshire at Westwood Boulevard must traverse ten lanes (including two left-turn pockets). According to a 1991 study by the Los Angeles Department of Transportation, this and the nearby intersection of Wilshire and Veteran are among the busiest in Los Angeles.[13] The boulevard's widest portion is in Westwood and Holmby Hills, where it expands to six, and briefly, eight lanes.
The sections of Wilshire Boulevard in the city of Los Angeles are notorious for their giant potholes.[14]

MacArthur Park connection[edit]
Wilshire Boulevard formerly ended at the MacArthur Park lake, but in 1934 a berm was built for it to cross and link up with the existing Orange Street (which ran from Figueroa to Alvarado) into downtown Los Angeles. Orange Street was renamed Wilshire and extended east of Figueroa to Grand. This divided the lake into two halves; the northern half was later drained.

In popular culture[edit]
American singer Lana Del Rey mentions Wilshire Boulevard in the song Honeymoon on her 2015 album of the same name, as well as American Rapper Nipsey Hussle, in the song "Dreamin'" on his fifth mixtape titled "The Marathon".[15] The 1997 film Volcano features the boulevard being destroyed by volcanic lava. On March 9, 1997, American East Coast rapper The Notorious B.I.G. was seated in the front passenger seat of an SUV, which came to a stop at the red light at the intersection of Wilshire and Fairfax. Another vehicle pulled up next to them, and the driver drew out a pistol and shot B.I.G. four times in a drive-by shooting, killing him.

See also[edit]
Ernest L. Webster, Los Angeles City Council member, 1927–31, helped introduce traffic-signal system
Harold A. Henry, Los Angeles City Council president active in beautifying the boulevard